if and when

if and when

• If and when the law catches up with them, I hope it has it in for them —Punch, 1967.

This phrase (along with as and when and unless and until) almost belongs to the category of the Fowlers' lost causes, but not quite. They wrote of it in The King's English (1906), ‘this formula has enjoyed more popularity than it deserves; either “when” or “if” by itself would almost always give the meaning’, and gave several examples to support their case, making an exception of the following quotation from Gladstone: If and when it was done, it was done so to speak judicially, in which the force of both if and when is needed. Significantly, this was their only example in the past tense; all the other examples referred to future time. While it is true that if alone (when there is doubt) or when alone (when there is no doubt) would often serve, there are contexts in which a point needs to be made with regard both to the likelihood of occurrence and to the time of it:

• Many drugs will be given if and when needed, probably with no obvious rhythm —J. M. Waterhouse et al., 1990.

The expression is especially popular with lawyers because at the very least it makes the same point doubly effective.